Less than two hours after I gave the order to Tavart Kiradze to assemble his troops, he called me and reported to me: "Comrade commander, the troops have been assembled and are ready to go at any time. ”

When Zhukov heard the news, he couldn't help but say with emotion: "I really can't see it, this Tavart Kiradze is quite capable, I thought that it would take him at least five hours or so to complete the assembly, but I didn't expect that in less than two hours, the troops were ready to set off." When I had the opportunity to meet him, I would like to ask him how he trained his troops and was able to assemble them in such a short time. ”

Seeing Zhukov's praise for Ta******Kiradze, I smiled bitterly and said in my heart: The reason why the 51st Guards Division was assembled so quickly was because they were the last to enter the battle, and Kharkov was recaptured by us almost after any fierce fighting. The main forces of the division were not dispersed in the first place, so the speed of assembly was naturally fast.

After Zhukov praised Tavart Kiradze, he said to Kravchenko: "It may not be possible for Comrade General to let your tank army open all at this moment. In this case, you first send a tank brigade to follow the 51st Guards Division, and in order to facilitate the troops to be ready for battle, you will assign the tank brigade as a battalion to each infantry regiment and disperse the march. ”

I, who was accustomed to the concentrated use of tank troops, suddenly heard Zhukov say this, and I couldn't help but be stunned for a moment. But on second thought, it's not bad either, each infantry regiment equipped with a tank battalion is a separate fighting cluster. Once you encounter the Germans, you can immediately engage in battle, entangle them, and wait for the troops behind to arrive, and then annihilate the enemy.

Since the 51st Guards Division completed the assembly ahead of schedule, our departure time was advanced to 5 o'clock in the afternoon. In Zhukov's words, while it was still early, let the troops quickly advance towards Chuhuev, strive to seize the city as soon as possible, and use it as a starting point for our offensive.

In front of the road was the first echelon of Lieutenant Colonel Lukin's 309th Regiment and the 1st Tank Battalion. And the guard battalion, led by me and Basmanov, acted with the second echelon. Originally, according to the plan, Tawalt Kiradze and his military command organs should be in the third echelon. Who knew that when he saw me in the second echelon, he temporarily changed his mind and asked his chief of staff to stay behind and follow me himself.

As the jeep was driving on the road, Tavart Kiradze cautiously asked me: "Comrade commander, I heard that we are going south to fight with the Southwestern Front?" ”

"That's right." To his question, I immediately answered in the affirmative, and then asked rhetorically: "Didn't Colonel Bezikov, when he explained the problem to you, make it clear the reason for the transfer of you?" ”

"Clear." Tavart Kiradze nodded and replied: "The chief of staff said that the 51st Guards Division, as the vanguard of the whole army, will capture Chuhuev first and give our troops a foothold. ”

"Now that the mission is clear, let's carry it out!" I said in an official tone: "After the capture of Chuhuyev, it is entirely possible to set up a camp and a temporary military station for the troops, and this will be of great benefit to restoring the physical strength of our commanders and fighters and maintaining the combat effectiveness of the troops." ”

"Understood, understood." Tawart Kiradze said with a smile: "Before the Azi troops set off, I had already asked Lieutenant Colonel Lukin to send scouts to reconnoiter the enemy in front. He is your old subordinate, and I am sure that his troops will be able to achieve unexpected results if they are in the vanguard. ”

I remembered that two-thirds of the commanders and fighters in Lukin's regiment were recruits who were replenished after the Germans were repulsed by us from Kursk, and hurriedly asked: "Are the recruits who have been replenished to the 309th regiment now have formed combat effectiveness?" ”

"Don't worry, Comrade Commander." Tavart Kiradze said with some pride: "I don't know how Lieutenant Colonel Lukin trained, the recruits have only been under him for a week, and their technical and tactical level is about the same as that of veterans of other regiments." In particular, during the offensive in the early hours of the morning, the three battalions under Lieutenant Colonel Lukin, with only two hundred men, broke through the German lines, stormed their regimental command post and killed the regimental commander. ”

"Good job." After listening to Tavart Kiradze's report, I couldn't help but be impressed by Lukin now, "You and I know what the defensive strength of the German regiment-level command is, and it is impossible to attack it without exceeding ten times the strength of the defenders, but I didn't expect Lukin to complete the task that at least one regiment can complete with only two companies." ”

As we talked, we passed a burned village out of our car window. When I saw the ruins of the village and the blackened trees around it, I couldn't help but hate it. I pointed out the window and said to Kiradze, ****** tower: "Comrade General, take a good look at the village outside, the Germans owe us another blood debt. ”

Tavartkiradze turned his head to look outside the village, then nodded vigorously and said, "Comrade commander, don't worry, we will recover this blood debt sooner or later. ”

Our car drove forward for a while before it suddenly stopped. Hearing the sudden sound of gunfire ahead, I knew that Lukin's vanguard and the Germans had exchanged fire. At this moment, a staff officer got out of the communication car in front of him, with a telegram in his hand, and ran quickly to my car, raised his hand and saluted, handed a telegram to me, and at the same time reported: "Comrade commander, the telegram is from Lieutenant Colonel Lukin, commander of the 309th Regiment, who says that he has encountered the enemy in front and that the troops are engaged in a fierce battle with the enemy. ”

I took the telegram, nodded to the staff officer, then looked at the contents of the telegram, and found that it was not much different from what the staff officer said, so I casually handed it to Tawalt Kiradze, and at the same time said optimistically: "Since we are outside the city and meet the German army, then the enemy must have no strong fortifications, as long as our tanks rush ahead, the enemy will be quickly defeated." ”

"A tank can crush the enemy?" Hearing my confident statement, Tavart Kiradze asked with some suspicion: "Comrade commander, you must know that during the day there are quite a few German troops breaking through, maybe there are thousands of Germans in the city, and with only two or three thousand guards divisions and a few tanks, can the enemy be defeated?" I don't quite believe that's the case anyway. ”

Hearing his suspicions, I didn't introduce them much, but just smiled faintly, and then said: "Comrade General, as for this battle between Lieutenant Colonel Lukin's troops and the German troops, I think we have a seventy percent chance of victory. If you don't believe me, just wait and see how the battle turns out! ”

Although my jeep and the truck carrying the guard battalion following behind had stopped, the infantry regiment of the 51st Guards Division, and the tanks of the tank brigade, were still moving rapidly along the dirt road, ready to reinforce the friendly forces that were outside Chuhuev.

I sat in the jeep and calmly listened to the sound of gunfire in front of me, thinking to myself that it would be a great disappointment if Lukin's troops, with the cooperation of the tank battalion, could not even defeat the Germans they encountered. I leaned back, my head resting on the back of my chair and my eyes closed, while Tawartkiradze restlessed, fearing that his men would suffer. After all, the Germans had just been driven out of Kharkov by us, and no one knew where their main forces went. If the enemy retreats to Chuhuev, then we can only blame our bad luck, and then the battle that is being fought now is pure hitting a stone with an egg. Then I have to think not about how to advance south, but how to safely withdraw to Kharkov.

However, the situation was obviously not as bad as I thought, and after about half an hour, the sound of gunfire in front of me suddenly became thin. This change made me feel as cramped and uneasy as Tawart Kiradze, and my eyes kept glancing at the communication vehicle parked in front of me, hoping that someone would come out of it soon and tell me the battle situation ahead.

But after waiting for a long time, I didn't see anyone coming in or out. Unexpectedly, at this time, Tavart Kiradze became much calmer, and he said to me with a smile: "Comrade commander, it seems that you guessed it right, our troops have won!" ”

"Our troops won?!" I was curious about his judgment, how could he possibly know that he was sitting in the car like me, and had not received any information on the way. Unless he has clairvoyance or ears, how can he know that my family has won? "On what basis did you make such a judgment?"

He pointed out the window and said with a smile: "You see, if the battle situation ahead is unfavorable, maybe the tanks will make way for the trucks and let them rush to the front to reinforce first." But now the formation of the troops has not changed in any way, and they are still maintaining the original speed and continue to advance, which proves that we have won the battle in front. ”

I listened to Tavart Kiradze's analysis, and I felt that it made sense, so I nodded and said: "This Lieutenant Colonel Lukin is too, what is the situation in the battle ahead, even if you don't send a telegram, you must send someone to report it, so that we can know it in our hearts." As a result, it's good now, there is no news at all, which makes the two of us worry here. ”

I was thinking about whether I should get out of the car and ask the front of the communication car to see if there was a telegram from Lukin. As soon as we put our hands on the handlebars, and before we could push the door, we saw a three-wheeled motorcycle in the distance, driving towards us in the opposite direction. Seeing this motorcycle that suddenly appeared, the stone hanging in my heart fell to the ground, I took my hand back and said softly: "It's finally here!" ”

"It's finally here!" Almost as I spoke, Tavart Kiradze cried out in delight.

A few minutes later, the motorcycle stopped next to us, and I pushed open the door and asked the officer who had just come out of the straddle: "Hey, comrade commander, did Lieutenant Colonel Lukin send you?" ”

The officer straightened up and reported to me: "Yes, Comrade Commander, it was Lieutenant Colonel Lukin who sent me to report to you on the battle ahead. With that, he took out a few pieces of paper from his briefcase and handed them to me.

"Hurry up and show it to me." I eagerly took the piece of paper from his hand and looked at it carefully.

I saw Lukin give a detailed account of how they discovered the enemy and how they exchanged fire with the enemy. Lukin wrote about the process at a very long time, and it took me a full five minutes to read it. After handing the report to Tavart Kiradze, I looked up and asked the officer standing in front of me: "Comrade commander, where is your regimental commander, Lieutenant Colonel Lukin, now?" ”

"When the enemy outside the city was repulsed by us, they fled into the city, and the regimental commander led his troops into the city."

"Is the enemy's resistance stubborn?" Tawart Kiradze flipped through the report and asked without raising his head: "Was it a one-touch collapse or did it take a resistance to retreat to the city in an organized manner?" ”

The officer glanced at his superiors, quickly straightened up and reported: "Report to Comrade Commander, when the vanguard battalion took the lead in exchanging fire with the enemy, the enemy behaved very tenaciously and suppressed our attacking troops with machine-gun fire, so that we could not advance. But when the tanks of the tank battalion appeared, the enemy's resistance weakened. Although the contents of his report were written in detail in Lukin's report, the officer, seeing what we wanted to hear, continued, "Comrade Regiment Commander seized this advantageous opportunity to organize troops to attack the enemy's positions again. The positions hastily constructed by the enemy were vulnerable to the divisions in front of our offensive. Soon, we broke through the German lines from several points under the cover of tanks. Seeing that the enemy could not resist it, the fast ones fled into the city, while the slower ones laid down their arms and surrendered to us. ”

Since Lukin's report did not mention the results they had achieved, when I heard this, I couldn't help but ask: "Comrade commander, have the results of your regiment been counted?" ”

The officer shook his head and said regretfully: "I'm sorry, Comrade Commander, since the battle has been going on, we haven't had time to count the concrete results. Probably seeing the look of disappointment on my face, he hurriedly added, "Although there is no accurate data, according to my observations, more than 20 tanks and armored vehicles, more than 50 motorcycles, and more than 300 soldiers destroyed the German army." Today, the road is littered with the wreckage of burning tanks, armoured vehicles and motorcycles, as well as the corpses of German soldiers. ”

I'm still very satisfied with this result. I glanced at Tavart Kiradze, and then said to him: "Comrade General, should you order the troops behind to speed up the march so that our troops can quickly control the whole of Chuhuev?" ”

"That's right, Comrade Commander, you're right." As he spoke, Tawalt Kiradze pushed open the door on his side, jumped off, and then turned to me and said, "I'm going to go to the communications van and give orders to the regimental commanders to speed up their march and join Lieutenant Colonel Lukin's troops as soon as possible. (To be continued.) )